KINGSTON, Jamaica— The government has announced a two-million-dollar reward for information surrounding Sunday’s fatal shooting in the community of Commodore in Linstead that claimed the lives of five people, including a child.

“There is a reward, and we will evaluate it as we go along in terms of how much more we can put towards incentivising the process of giving information. But outside of that, it is a duty of every citizen to provide us with the information. I really sincerely urge those citizens, those members of the communities who know, please share the information with us. It is ultimately in your benefit,” said Prime Minister Andrew Holness.

The prime minister urged citizens to cooperate with the police by sharing useful information about the incident to bring the perpetrators to justice.

“I want every Jamaican to think of this. I mean, even though we have had this terrible set of murders here in one incident, we are still 40 per cent below where we were last year. So we are still on a good track and we can do even better if every Jamaican were to agree that the criminals must be dealt with. They must be brought to justice. We will not protect them. We will not speak on their behalf. We will have a singular focus on making Jamaica peaceful,” he said.

The prime minister, who was speaking during a tour of the community on Monday, said the shooting incident is an act of criminal terror and said he gives his full support to the police to bring the perpetrators to justice.

“Now, as this is from our perspective, an act of criminal terror, the police must dedicate resources to this and focus on ensuring that the perpetrators are brought to justice. This is not a directive from me; it is not a directive from the minister of national security, though of course, it is within our policy remit and framework, but I’ve heard the commissioner himself speak to say this is what the security forces will do, and I give my full support to the security forces to pursue this,” Holness said.

The prime minister noted that the fatal shooting is similar to that of the Cherry Tree Lane massacre in Clarendon, which left eight dead and nine injured and noted that the police will be acting similarly to prevent reprisals.

“Not so long ago we saw Cherry Tree Lane where I visited and from what I have been told and what I have seen, I don’t want to speak too much on the operational issues, that’s the remit of the police, but it would appear to me that the circumstances are similar and there are things that we would have learned from the Cherry Tree Lane incident and one of them is to prevent reprisals and I’m certain that the police will be acting in such a way to ensure that there are no reprisals or to prevent them as much as possible and to be proactive in ensuring that you know there is a proper security presence and cordon in the area to protect the citizens here and to prevent any retaliation coming from outside or even from inside going out. So the learnings have been adopted into the strategy, and I’m certain that the police will be very effective in what they do,” Holness said.

“The second thing that we have learned is that whatever we do as a security response must have endurance. So the criminals sometimes they will go and hide, and as the commissioner said, they have safe haven and people protect them and surround them, and then they wait and then they come back. That would be a fatal error on their part because what we have built into the security forces is endurance. So they will stay in the community, they will maintain a long-term presence, and they will not just wait out the criminals they will actively seek the criminals,” he said.

READ: 4-y-o among five killed by gunmen ‘posing as police’ in Linstead

Reports are that gunmen posing as police attacked a family yard, leaving nine people shot, five of them fatally, including a four-year-old child.

The incident unfolded at approximately 8:45 pm on Sunday, when several men, some reportedly wearing police-style vests, descended on the premises along Commodore main road. According to police reports, the attackers rushed into the yard and opened fire on the occupants.